Ask the Author: Nick Meynen
Answered Questions (2)
Nick Meynen
First: get out there. Walk. Fall. Get up. Repeat. Don't talk to people, listen to them. Follow instincts, change plans, get out of your comfort zone. All my books start from experiences I've had, often way out of my comfort zone.
Second: work hard. Be stubborn. Persist. My books ususally grow for five to even ten years in my mind. They take around 1000 hours spread over 3 years to write. Almost each and every sentence has been rewritten, up to 10 times for the hardest parts. Jack Kerouac apparently wrote "on the road" in one drugged trip but that's not what writing is about for most people and certainly not for me. It is a lonely, frustrating and hard working job that pays off all of that years after you have labored on it far from any spotlight.
Third: dream big. Start with idealism and ambition. Think triology. Think translations. Book tours. What's a decade in one lifetime? Don't be afraid of dreaming big just because you think that this will only lead to disappointments. No book project ever started by thinking small, at least not with me. Many disappointments will come along the way but just go back to point one. Walk. Fall. Get up.
Fourth: expose your weaknesses early on. Ask feedback and ask to be hard on you. I share very early drafts full of errors, even thought errors. I learn a whole lot by these "written conversations" with friends, family, people I interviewed, editors. My books are living documents until the moment they are printed.
Five. Never mind the spelling nazis. I make spelling mistakes all the time but that doesn't disqualify me from being able to tell a good story. I first go with the flow and keep corrections for later, with some help here and there.
Six. Ignore all of the above :-) Seriously, there's no "how to become a writer in 3 weeks" guidebook. But maybe just remember the first advice. Walk. Fall. Get up. Repeat.
Second: work hard. Be stubborn. Persist. My books ususally grow for five to even ten years in my mind. They take around 1000 hours spread over 3 years to write. Almost each and every sentence has been rewritten, up to 10 times for the hardest parts. Jack Kerouac apparently wrote "on the road" in one drugged trip but that's not what writing is about for most people and certainly not for me. It is a lonely, frustrating and hard working job that pays off all of that years after you have labored on it far from any spotlight.
Third: dream big. Start with idealism and ambition. Think triology. Think translations. Book tours. What's a decade in one lifetime? Don't be afraid of dreaming big just because you think that this will only lead to disappointments. No book project ever started by thinking small, at least not with me. Many disappointments will come along the way but just go back to point one. Walk. Fall. Get up.
Fourth: expose your weaknesses early on. Ask feedback and ask to be hard on you. I share very early drafts full of errors, even thought errors. I learn a whole lot by these "written conversations" with friends, family, people I interviewed, editors. My books are living documents until the moment they are printed.
Five. Never mind the spelling nazis. I make spelling mistakes all the time but that doesn't disqualify me from being able to tell a good story. I first go with the flow and keep corrections for later, with some help here and there.
Six. Ignore all of the above :-) Seriously, there's no "how to become a writer in 3 weeks" guidebook. But maybe just remember the first advice. Walk. Fall. Get up. Repeat.
Nick Meynen
The easy answer would probably be to name just one flash, a great "aha" moment, which I could then blow up to magical proportions. The more honest answer is that this idea grew on me as I was busy mapping environmental conflicts globally, as part of my day-job for an environmental non-profit. I came across so many strong stories from people such as Sumaira Abdulali, a women risking her life and winning court battles to stop the sand mafia in India. I also travelled to many environmental frontlines, for example with nuclear engineer Bruno Chareyron as my guide on a toxic tour to an abandoned uranium mine in Bulgaria. Their stories are so inspiring, important, little-known and a great way to lay the foundations for this book. I do what I do in all my books: I use stories, anekdotes, experiences, short reflections and I order them in such a way that slowly, a bigger picture emerges. The idea for this book also grew while seeing ever clearer the many connections between the strong stories I came across and the theories of how our world works. I learned the latter mostly from the geographers, ecological economists and political ecologists that I work with. They often use difficult terms like "unequal ecological exchange", "ecological debt" or "metabolism of the global economy". All of them are fascinating concepts to understand our world, but in need of unpacking.
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